Letter from the Editor
Alumni Magazine of the
Fashion Institute of Technology

Welcome to Hue’s special textiles issue.

Textiles are art and technology, design and business, wildly creative and entirely

practical—exactly like FIT. What’s more, every human, from birth to death, spends just
about every moment in, on, or near textiles. Fabrics and fibers are a vast topic, touching
Hue is the alumni magazine of the
Fashion Institute of Technology,
a State University of New York
college of art and design, business
and technology. It is published
three times a year by the Division
of Communications and External
Relations, 227 West 27 Street,
Room B905, New York,
NY 10001-5992, 212 217.4700.
Email: hue@fitnyc.edu
Vice President for Communications
and External Relations
Loretta Lawrence Keane
Assistant Vice President
for Communications
Carol Leven
Editor
Linda Angrilli
Managing Editor
Alex Joseph
Staff Writer
Jonathan Vatner
Editorial Assistant
Laura Hatmaker

many industries, and with an enormous impact on the lives of people who produce and use
them, on resources like land and water, on economies around the world, and, ultimately,
on the health of the planet.

Hue rarely does a theme issue; we usually highlight FIT’s diversity by featuring an

assortment of alumni from a wide range of majors. But we kept finding alumni who are
involved in the textile industry in various ways, all with impressive careers. It just made
sense to gather some of them together in one issue. Alumni work in large and small companies as designers, developers, manufacturers, marketers, and conservators. They work with
fabrics and fibers ranging from traditional to high-tech. So there was plenty of diversity
after all.

So here it is: a feast of fabrics! A fabulosity of fibers! And an amazing smorgasbord of

images that make us happy: a first-century Peruvian tunic … Kirk Douglas in Acrilan … a
“snagger” that looks like a medieval mace in miniature. For some related content, I invite
you to check out Hue Too at blog.fitnyc.edu/huetoo. Then email us at hue@fitnyc.edu and
let us know what you think about textiles or anything else.

And if you don’t love the smiling alpacas on page 23, well, I just don’t know what to

Cover
The fabric on the cover of our textiles issue
was designed by William Storms, Textile/
Surface Design ’13, and fabricated in FIT’s
knitting lab by classroom assistant Kathryn
Malik, Patternmaking ’84 and Production
Management: Textiles ’86. (The two are shown
here with Ann Denton, Textile Development
and Marketing faculty member and knitting
lab coordinator, far right.) They worked hard
to render the Hue logo in the right place, in the
right font. Malik imported Storms’s design file
into a CAD program that converted each pixel
into a stitch for the Stoll CMS 340TC 5.2-gauge
knit-and-wear machine. (Gauge is the number
of needles per inch on the machine, an indicator
of how heavy a fabric it can produce.) The
blue-green yarn is cotton, the purple is acrylic.

28

Malik added extra yarn to tighten the knit
structure. “It’s the cover of a magazine, so
‘drape-ability’ isn’t an issue,” she says. Storms
says of the result, “I think it has great rhythm
and is reminiscent of the ombré effect I was
aiming for.”

17
Features

Departments

6 A Close Look
A sumptuous shawl from The Museum
at FIT’s textile collection

22 Soft Focus
In companies large and small, alumni
produce a broad range of fabrics

World-renowned designer and FIT alumnus
Michael Kors has donated $1 million to establish
an all-inclusive endowed scholarship for one
promising Fashion Design student each year,
in-state, out-of-state, or international, who
demonstrates financial need. The scholarship,
which begins this fall, covers all costs associated with an associate and bachelor’s degree,
including tuition, housing, and books, even
study abroad in Italy. Winning students will
also be given an internship at Michael Kors,
with mentorship by the designer himself. “It
makes me so excited to see the potential talent
that has been helped by this school, and I look
forward to seeing that continue,” he said.

Jerry Speier

what’s happening on campus

Kors Donates $1 Million
to Endow Scholarship

Why Did You Choose FIT?
On January 29, FIT’s Office of Development and Alumni Relations kicked off a major campaign
to create connections among alumni and rekindle attachment to the college. More than 300
alumni signed up to attend the inaugural event, held at the Strand Hotel. So why did they choose
FIT? Here are a few responses.
“After I got my degree in design from a private school, I said, man, I should have come to FIT
the first time!” —Shawn’ta Samuels, Production Management ’12
“I came to this country in 1988 from Poland with political asylum, with a dream to have
a fashion business.” —Mariola Przetakiewicz, Fashion Design ’93
“For the city campus.” —Brooke Hagel, Fashion Design ’03
“The advertisements convinced me. I’m a visual person.” —Leon Raymond Mitchell, Photography ’75
“I didn’t want debt.” —Katie Cole, Interior Design ’12

FIT to Train More Emerging
Designers
Following the success of last year’s Design
Entrepreneurs NYC program, organized
by FIT and the New York City Economic
Development Corporation, the program will
enroll a second class of designers this June.
The free, intensive session teaches up to 35
emerging designers skills for launching and
expanding their fashion labels. FIT faculty
and industry executives, headed by Jeanette
Nostra, president of G-III Apparel Group,
will cover marketing, operations, and financial
management; students will graduate with a
business plan and the opportunity to present
it to a panel of influential fashion leaders.
Visit designentrepreneursnyc.com for more
information.

A 12.5-credit certificate program in Sustainable
Packaging Design will launch this fall. Not a
design program per se, it is geared toward
professionals with at least one year of experience in a related field: design, production,
materials, marketing, among others. In just one
year—two evening/weekend courses in fall,
one in winter, and two in spring—students
learn to integrate sustainable principles into
the packaging development process. For more
information, visit fitnyc.edu/SPD.

Mallory Hagan, an Advertising and Marketing Communications student, became Miss America on January
12. She advocated for the awareness and prevention
of child sexual abuse, and she rocked out to James
Brown’s “Get Up Offa That Thing” in her tap shoes.

President Brown Earns Accolade

and rigorous peer evaluation, FIT has been
reaccredited with commendation by the
Middle States Commission on Higher Education.
The “commendation” is a rare accolade that
means no follow-up report is necessary.

helps students from disadvantaged backgrounds
earn their degree, is number one in student
community colleges with an EOP program. In
fall 2012, 40.4 percent of FIT’s EOP students
achieved a GPA of at least 3.0.

Shoe Obsession, a love letter to impractical
footwear, was a hit at The Museum at FIT with
more than 150 envy-inducing styles by Manolo
Blahnik, Christian Louboutin, Alexander
McQueen, and other star designers. The show
ran until April 13. Visit fitnyc.edu/hue to see a
feature about the exhibition.
Another footwear-focused show in the
museum was Boots: The Height of Fashion, a capstone exhibition by students in the MA program
in Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory,
Museum Practice. It closed April 6.

Toy Design Professor Honored

>> FIT’s Educational Opportunity Program, which

retention (98 percent) among the 14 SUNY

Prada, Spring 2012.

Well-Heeled Exhibitions

President Joyce F. Brown.

QUICK READ

>> Following a five-year process of self-study

The Museum at FIT

Dr. Joyce F. Brown, president of FIT for the past
15 years, was one of 25 public- and civic-minded
women to receive City & State magazine’s 2013
Above and Beyond Award, for her achievements
as an educator and academic administrator and
for her advocacy for public higher education.
City & State, which covers the politics, policy, and
personalities of New York City and New York
State, established the awards in 2011 to recognize female leaders in business, public service,
journalism, nonprofits, and labor advocacy.

>> Barnes & Noble awarded 12 of FIT’s Presidential
Scholars a total of $25,000 for independent
study and travel projects last summer, from
protecting sea turtles in Costa Rica to painting
a mural at a French hospital.
>> Pioneering African-American fashion designer
Stephen Burrows ’66 is the subject of a
retrospective, currently on view at the Museum
of the City of New York.
>> FIT is co-sponsoring a contest to design a
memorial that will hang on the building where
the Triangle Shirtwaist fire claimed 146 lives

Judy Ellis, the tireless, inspiring founder and
chair of FIT’s Toy Design baccalaureate program—
the first in the field—was inducted into the Toy
Industry Hall of Fame in February, joining such
industry greats as George Lucas and Milton
Bradley. An estimated 3,500 products have been
designed by Toy Design alumni, including Hasbro’s
Elefun Busy Ball Popper, Mattel Fisher-Price’s
Sing-a-Ma-Jigs, and Crayola’s Crayon Town.

Ltd.’s first design contest at FIT, which came
with a $2,500 prize. Tovar created a twist on the
cat-eye glasses frame, and Ha designed a rimless
pair using a mixed metal called mokume-gane,
originally used in Japanese swords.
>> Tiffany Spagnuolo, Fashion Design ’13, won first
prize and $5,000 for her lingerie creation, Dark
Bloom, at the 2013 Femmy Awards Student
Design Contest, held at Cipriani 42nd Street on
February 5.
>> The Tomodachi Initiative, a partnership
between the U.S. and Japan to invest in Japan
following the earthquake of 2011, has joined
Jerry Speier

forces with fast-fashion powerhouse Uniqlo

Alan Hassenfeld, vice president of Hassenfeld Family
Initiatives and chairman of the executive committee
of Hasbro, Inc.; Ellis; and Neil Friedman, president of Neil
B. Friedman Associates and former president of Mattel
Brands, Mattel, Inc. Watch a tribute to Ellis at fitnyc.edu/
toydesign.

Parents Day, which was moved to February 23 because
of Hurricane Sandy, went off without a hitch. Despite
the threat of a snowstorm, about 115 families attended
the campus tours, club performances, and classes.

to offer the $1.6 million Tomodachi-Uniqlo
Fellowship. Each year for the next three years,
Japanese students will get the chance to study
Global Fashion Management at FIT and enroll
in similar programs at other colleges.

ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

5

A Close
Look

Designers and researchers love
The Museum at FIT’s textile collection
Textiles embody culture, economics, and social history.
Take the wool-and-silk shawl shown at right, with its curved
shapes and resplendent colors, from The Museum at FIT’s
textile collection. As early as the 17th century, colonialism
resulted in a variety of goods flowing to Europe from the
East, and an “exotic” aesthetic became fashionable. Handwoven shawls from Kashmir, India, were prized by the
aristocracy, and featured in portraits by artists like David
and Ingres. With the Industrial Revolution, and the invention of the jacquard loom, designs with many colors and
intricate patterns could be mass produced. There was a
craze for shawls like this one, from the 1850s. Their sinuous,
budlike motif, called boteh, acquired the name of the Scottish
town known for producing them: Paisley.
The museum’s collection offers a wealth of such insights
into the history and meaning of textiles. Since 1969, FIT
students, faculty, scholars, and industry professionals have
come to do research and find inspiration. Others have, too.
For instance, Disney’s Pixar Animation Studios found fabrics
and patterns to adapt for settings and characters in the films
Up and The Incredibles. The permanent collection comprises
some 30,000 apparel and home furnishings fabrics, laces,
embroideries, quilts, and shawls, along with pieces by noted
designers such as Sonia Delaunay, William Morris, and
Junichi Arai. In addition, more than 100,000 swatches are
grouped into categories such as wovens, prints, abstracts,
and “conversationals” (novelty prints, with motifs like
elephants or cats).

–Alex Joseph

MFIT

Email museuminfo@fitnyc.edu for details about design
memberships, which offer access to the collection.

6

hue | spring 2013

trend spotter
Colby DeMarco
a student in first person

Fabric Styling ’14, Fashion Merchandising Management ’12

Your hair is really striking. What’s the story behind it?

I used to have it parted to one side and shaved underneath,
but one day I let it hang down as a bowl cut, and I kinda liked
it. Then I saw the music video for “Alejandro” by Lady Gaga;
all the guys have bowl cuts. Random people are always calling
me Alejandro.
What exactly does one learn in Fabric Styling?

Styling is about choosing clothes or home furnishings that
work well together for photo shoots or individual clients.
We make a lot of trend boards, but we also design textiles; we
either use a computer or we paint. I think most of us want to
do either styling or trend forecasting. I want to become a
creative or art director for editorial.
What trend boards have you done?

I did one on kimonos from the Han Dynasty that have been
showing up on designers’ runways. Fashion is always repeating
itself—that’s one reason I’m doing a minor in art history. Like
the bad clip art and graphic design from the early ’90s that’s
coming back right now on T-shirts. Sometimes fashion can
trick you into wearing ugly clothes.
You interned in the fashion department of Men’s Health.
They have a fashion department?

Everyone jokes about who picks the T-shirt on the cover, but
the magazine does include fashion, especially on the website.
The editors bought me a camera to photograph street style
during Fashion Week, and I wrote the site’s Look and Learn
features, where I took sloppily dressed celebrities on the red
carpet and said what they did wrong and what people could
learn from it. I also helped with the Grooming Awards. All
these companies sent in their newest products, and we tested
them out and picked winners. I still use products from Men’s
Health from almost a year ago.
You also interned at Stylesight, the trend forecasting
company. What did you do there?

I did a whole report on the color pink. We found a pink coffee
pot, and the pink gymnastics floor at the Olympics, and the
September covers of Elle, Vogue, and Harper’s Bazaar. Pink
was having a moment.
Where are you working now?

Organic Avenue, a vegan raw food and juice shop. There are
ten in the city, and they’re expanding really fast. It’s not the
Americanized version of health, where everything is low-fat.
It’s about nutrition and a raw-food lifestyle.
Are you vegan?

8

hue | spring 2013

Erica Lansner

I’m vegetarian, but most days I’m vegan because I eat
at the shop.

The Mia Maxi, made of cotton/spandex jersey, is part of
100% NY’s spring 2013 collection.

Matthew Seprimus

Pattern cutting is essential to fashion, but ever think about
the leftover fabric—typically 15 to 20 percent of the total used
to make a garment? Instead of recycling it (more expensive),
the industry throws it away, adding countless tons of textile
waste to landfills the world over. But Daniel Silverstein,
Fashion Design ’10, departs from this unsustainable practice
with his line of contemporary sportswear, called 100% NY,
which produces zero fabric waste. To accomplish this, he
incorporates a pattern’s remainders into the garment as
appliqués, such as the columns of vertebrae-like embellishments on the sleek gray-blue “Spine” dress worn by Jennifer
Hudson on a British late-night show in 2011. (The singer’s
stylist spotted the dress while Silverstein was showing his
first collection to a Soho boutique.) Silverstein’s eco-friendly
but chic looks are getting a much bigger audience now, thanks
to his role as a contestant on Season 2 of NBC’s Fashion Star,
a fashion-design reality show with a retail focus.
“‘Eco’ has such a negative connotation in fashion, but
zero-waste design doesn’t have to look eco,” the New Jersey
native says at his Park Slope studio, a curvilinear henna
tattoo on his right biceps peeking out from underneath a trim
henley. (He has a real tattoo—of a sewing machine—on his
lower back.) So instead of hemp, which looks decidedly
crunchy, Silverstein uses high-end sustainable fabrics like
cupro, which feels like silk but is made from the byproduct
of cotton ginning, and Repreve, a nylon mostly composed of
recycled plastic bottles. And as the name 100% NY suggests,
the line is produced in New York City, or within “doubledigit miles” of it. In the future he’d like to go “vertical” and
produce everything in house.
Pieces range from a blouse or skirt (from the mid-$100s)
to gowns (from $800) and can be found online at Shopbop
and, this spring, on Bona Drag, as well as at the Washington,
DC, shop C.A.T.Walk. They can also be purchased through
100% NY’s own site, often at a discount. Silverstein expects
more retailers to come aboard after Fashion Star; he is
planning to move to a bigger studio in the Garment District
to handle the anticipated demand.
“I don’t think about it as sustainability in fashion,” he
says of his work. “I just think about zero waste as the future
of the industry.” —Sean Kennedy

insights from the classroom and beyond

steps toward a sustainable future

Whole Cloth

Back to the
Drawing Board
Karen Gentile, chairperson
Textile/Surface Design
In this industry, we’re always looking for fresh ideas. Each student has
an individual way of looking at things, but often they don’t realize it. So
I encourage them to always keep an inspiration book. Something you can
sketch or paste things into, like swatches of fabric, magazine tear sheets,
or photographs. I’m big on sketching and photographing—textures, color,
shapes, graffiti, or store windows. A rusty appliance lying on the street
can be great for thinking about texture. I tell them: It’s always good to
have your sketchbook in your lap. Even when you’re on the phone, save
those doodles! Surface designers have to have fresh ideas all the time,
and they can use any medium to create the original art: drawing, collage,
painting, or the computer. On a job, they might be asked to come up with
an original take on a familiar theme. In class, I’ll give them one, like
“nature”—and see what associations they make. That’s when their
inspiration book comes in handy. They might come up with images of
lizards and plants; or they might use more eclectic juxtapositions. They
might draw floating fish, with keys drifting in the background. The
designer Piero Fornasetti was famous for this kind of surrealism: an
image of a Greek column might end up on a necktie, or an eyeball might
appear on a plate pattern. Once, I took my class to a design firm, and
the people giving the tour were FIT grads. They said they showed their
inspiration books during the interview, and it helped them get hired.
Now the company asks all their designers to keep one.

ou don’t have to leave FIT’s campus to see work by Dorothy
Cosonas ’85, the creative director of Knoll Textiles. Just go
to the Haft Auditorium and look at the seats. In 2011, they
were reupholstered with a fabric called Harrison, in a red
colorway that fairly glimmers in the cavernous space. “It was one of the first
textiles I did here,” says Cosonas, who’s been at Knoll eight years. “It’s a
classic wool. A nod to our past.”
That past includes the history of the famous Knoll company, founded
in 1940 by Hans Knoll and known for producing iconic modern furniture in
collaboration with Ludwig Mies van der Rohe and Eero Saarinen, among
others. His wife, Florence Knoll Basset, founded the company’s textile division
in 1947, eventually becoming president of the entire firm. The company
became a highly influential proponent of textile designs for modern interiors.
They collaborated with artist weavers such as Anni Albers and Sheila Hicks.
They also produced innovative designs by FIT alumni Jhane Barnes,
Fashion Design ’75, and Suzanne Tick, Textile Design ’82, who served as
the firm’s creative director from 1997 to 2004.
Today, renowned Knoll furniture, such as Saarinen’s Womb chair, comes
specified with Knoll fabrics. Knoll Textiles can also be found in offices, like
the Exxon Mobil headquarters, in Houston; in hospitality and health care
settings; in quirkier projects like cross-stitch upholstery for a line of Vans
sneakers; in residences; and at institutions like Northwestern University—
and, of course, FIT.
Cosonas, smart, lean, and upbeat, is wearing a black vintage Chanel
jacket with white trim. She comes across as thoughtful but not dreamy.
“There’s an emotional side to textiles—the things we respond to in a fabric,”
Cosonas says, but she has a head for business, too. If she creates upholstery
with a novelty yarn she loves but it doesn’t hold up to standard industry
tests, it must be redesigned to get it right.
Designing textiles for Knoll, Cosonas is constantly finding new ways to
explore the firm’s tradition of classic, modern design. Sometimes that means
revisiting the archives. Harrison, for example, is based on the Knoll archival
fabric Prestini (1948). Praised by Florence Knoll as “the sort of simple and
direct design we are looking for,” Prestini was trend-resistant enough to
stay in the line (with tweaks to fiber content and finishing) for 35 years. In
2007, to commemorate the firm’s 60th anniversary, Cosonas introduced the

From Sketch to Finished Product
Cosonas still makes pencil sketches for her designs, like this
one for Icon, an upholstery fabric inspired by current ethnic
and embroidery trends in fashion. Icon comes in several
colorways and can be specified for Knoll’s Tulip chair,
designed by Eero Saarinen in 1955-56.

Dan Lecca, courtesy of Rodarte

Above: Cosonas’s Harrison
fabric. She says, “It’s a hopsack
pattern, woven in Scotland
on a custom-colored warp
combined with a bi-colored
weft, allowing for a clean,
clear palette.”

Cosonas’s Kamani (in three colorways, right)
for Knoll Luxe was handwoven in India. Above:
Using old-world screen-printing techniques,
artisans carefully distribute their weight to
create an even pattern.

Nick Parisse ’09

Archival Collection, for which she restyled six
classic Knoll textiles, including one by Anni
Albers. She added five new colorways to Cato
(1961), the company’s longest-produced fabric.
The collection was well received—Metropolis
magazine called it “a virtual primer on Modern
textile masters”—but Cosonas has also contributed a number of ideas all her own.
In 2008, she launched Knoll Luxe, a brand
focusing on the high-end residential market.
She designs most of these drapery and upholstery
fabrics herself, though she has also collaborated with up-and-coming American fashion
designers, and thus cultivated one of her deepest
passions. “When Vogue magazine shows up at my

“I try to live up to the Knoll name, not off it,”
Cosonas says.

12

hue | spring 2013

house, my husband will say, ‘The Bible arrived
today,’” she says. “Fashion is the one discipline
that still has an edge.”
One of the first Luxe projects was a collaboration with Lazaro Hernandez and Jack McCollough
of Proenza Schouler. For the 2010 collection,
Cosonas sought out Kate and Laura Mulleavy,
the sisters behind Rodarte. “There aren’t a lot
of designers I would approach,” Cosonas says.
“They have to have the right aesthetic. It’s not
about a designer who knows how to cut a jacket.
I need a designer who understands color, texture,
and pattern.” Rodarte, known for distressing
the fabric of their garments by tearing, burning,
and sanding, fit the bill. “I was relentless about
getting them. My gut told me these girls were
right for us.” Using her technical expertise, she
helped Rodarte translate some of their designs,
including a “spider web” dress with shimmering
Lurex strands, into eight fabrics, each named
for a poet they admired—Auden, Cummings,
Byron. (Auden appears on page 10.) The resulting
collection was praised in The New York Times for
its “meticulous attention to detail and keen sense
of texture and structure.”
Although Knoll Luxe is a new brand, it is also,
in a way, a reference to tradition. One of Florence
Knoll’s first innovations was to repurpose men’s

suit fabrics for office furniture. Fashion provides
a direct inspiration for Luxe, but it’s also present
in the more mass-market Knoll Textile brand.
The firm doesn’t use color trend forecasters, for
example; Cosonas, who is known for her clean,
clear use of color, takes her cues from the
runways. “No matter how ‘global’ we get,” she
says, “fashion houses still allow us to feel excited
and get inspired.”
The Knoll Textiles management team meets
quarterly to discuss what is needed for the line.
Then Cosonas and her team of six, including
three FIT grads (“They call us ‘The FIT Mafia,’”
she laughs), get to work. It takes a year to move
fabrics from concept to sales floor. Each collection requires decisions about fiber, structure, and
color, and it all has to say “Knoll.” Overly shiny
fabrics, for example, aren’t sophisticated or
timeless enough. And she’s never going to design
traditional damask (birds and flowers) for the
firm; it’s not sufficiently urban or masculine.
Cosonas considers color exhaustively. “If it’s
designed ten years ago or tomorrow, and woven
at a mill in Scotland, New Zealand, or the U.S.,
it has to be speaking through a color idea.” The
company works with 90 mills around the world.
It would be impossible to match yarns perfectly
across such a wide array of manufacturers, but

Cosonas makes sure they’re all part of the Knoll
color story. While a certain turquoise might thrill
her, she’s always wondering if it’s right for
everyone else. “Bill Blass used to say, ‘Wealthy
women outside of New York don’t always wear
black,’” she says. How, one might ask, does
Cosonas draw the line between, say, “bold” and
“garish”? With a wry smile, she says, “Sometimes
you gotta trust your gut.”
The Long Island native came to FIT for Fine
Arts, but returned for Textile/Surface Design to
please her practical-minded father. She lived at a
boarding house run by the Ladies Christian
Union in the West Village and liked the structure
of two meals a day and curfew. She studied art
history with Richard Martin and weaving with
Nell Znamierowski. Instructor Karen Randall
introduced Cosonas to Sina Pearson, then
creative director for Unika Vaev, who hired her.
Cosonas started as an administrative
assistant and “sample girl”—if someone wanted
a UV swatch, she retrieved it. Pearson, she says,
took her under her wing. “She was my graduate
school.” Cosonas stayed with the firm 21 years,
the last ten as design director. Among her many
designs for them was Look, inspired by a checker-

board illustration by designer Alexander Girard.
It’s still a best seller.
Despite her fascination with fashion, the
quality Cosonas most admires in a fabric is
longevity. She speaks reverently of Cato, still in
production 50 years later. “That’s not even classic
anymore,” she says. “It’s timeless.” But this
admiration is tempered with an understanding
of how ordinary people live their lives, and the
strange alchemy that a thoughtfully made textile
can create. “I think textiles just add happiness to
a space,” she says. 
“People in the industry still say to me,
‘Are you the one who designed Look?’”
Cosonas says. “That’s fame in the
contract-textile world.”

Cosonas’s mother’s needlework, below, was an
inspiration for Marquee. Right: A collection of
Knoll upholstery fabrics, including Mod Plaid,
Marquee, and Tryst, won a gold award last year
at NeoCon, a premier trade event. Cosonas’s
work is also in the Cooper-Hewitt National Design
Museum’s permanent collection.

hat’s more disappointing than a beautiful shirt tearing
when you cross your arms? Or the color from a sofa
rubbing off on your pants? Assistant Professor Sean
Cormier has built his career on preventing textile mishaps
like these. He worked in quality assurance at Liz Claiborne for 18 years—
overseeing a billion dollars of clothing at one point—before becoming
director of quality assurance at slipcover manufacturer Sure Fit six
years ago.
Cormier sums up his job by saying, “Designers make pretty things,
and I make sure it all works.”
When he joined FIT’s faculty in 2009, he expanded and modernized the
textile testing lab. The new state-of-the-art lab, which opened in 2010, is
more comprehensive than many testing labs he’s seen in the industry. There,
2,500 students per year from ten business and design majors learn how
to test garments for durability, flammability, color transference (called
crocking), wrinkle-resistance, and more. Knowledge of the testing process,
Cormier explains, is crucial for almost anyone working in the fashion industry.
There is no universal quality standard for textiles. But two organizations—the American Association of Textile Chemists and Colorists and ASTM
International (formerly the American Society of Testing and Materials)—
publish guidelines for hundreds of materials, for use in everything from
hosiery to upholstery, from drapes to capes. The standards are updated
every year as testing methods and clothing technology improve and as laws
and public expectations change. Using those guidelines, each manufacturer
and retailer sets its own rules, and all the products are tested at least once—
and usually two or three times—before hitting shelves. “More expensive
doesn’t necessarily mean better,” Cormier warns. “Consumers are paying
more for the brand and the fit than the durability.” These pages offer a peek
inside FIT’s testing lab.

The snagging machine rotates the fabric under a medieval-looking spiked ball,
about the size of a golf ball, to test how badly it will snag.

The tensile strength machine stretches a swatch until the fabric
or seam rips; the monitor displays how many pounds of tension
were applied. Because knits will stretch rather than tear, a ball
attachment punctures the fabric instead.

Cotton

Cashmere

Acrylic

Lab photos by Matthew Septimus

An ordinary microscope is used to investigate the type and quality of
fibers in a fabric. For example it can be used to tell when a “cashmere”
sweater is actually acrylic.

To test colorfastness, Cormier puts the
fabric into a canister with ten steel balls
and a standardized detergent and runs
it in the Launder-Ometer, a machine that
simulates five home washings at once. The
swatch above shows how cotton, polyester,
and other fibers absorb color from the
test fabric.

The pilling and abrasion machine rubs swatches for a prescribed
number of rotations—3,000 to 9,000, depending on fabric weight.
Then the sample is inspected for pilling and wear.
ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

15

A crocking machine tests how much color rubs
off of fabrics. Cormier slides a white swatch over
the fabric in question using the manually operated
machine, which looks like an industrial stapler.
Ideally—for the sake of white pants and sofas
everywhere—the swatch won’t pick up any color.

By law, all fabrics used in clothing must meet flameretardancy standards. When Cormier burned a swatch of
ramie, or Chinese linen, in the flammability hood, right,
it went up in flames. Bad sign.

Incandescent

Daylight

Fluorescent

Light is necessary for us to perceive color—and
the type of light in which we see a color affects
how it looks to us. The light box (also called a
Macbeth box, after a company that manufactures
them) shows designers, producers, and buyers how
fabrics would look in fluorescent and incandescent
light, as well as in daylight. Many textiles, including
these samples, look significantly different under
different light. Most companies would avoid
producing such fabrics.

Colors fade in sunlight. Instead
of leaving swatches outside for
a few weeks, the process is
speeded up with a Xenon
Fade-Ometer. In order to satisfy
most quality standards, indoor
fabrics must not fade more than
a few shades after 20 hours
in the Fade-Ometer; outdoor
fabrics must withstand 60 hours
of intense light.

If a customer buys slipcovers for a sofa and dining room chairs
in one color, they must look exactly alike. But slight mismatches
can be difficult to detect in a light box. That’s where the spectrophotometer comes in. It measures the exact color of a fabric
sample under the three most common types of light (incandescent, fluorescent, daylight) to remove subjectivity from the
color-reading process. In this readout of three samples, two
matched and one did not.

16

hue | spring 2013

See a video of
the lab at
blog.fitnyc.edu/
huetoo.

7 Fibers WORLD
that
changed
the

Until the 20th century,
all textiles were natural. Wool, linen, cotton, and silk
were the essential ingredients of the fashionable world,
and all could be found in a wide range of qualities from
coarse to luxuriously refined.

Increased textile production capacity after the

Industrial Revolution led to a search for fibers that
could be produced in larger quantities, without disruptions from weather or plant and animal diseases. The
emerging chemical industry turned its experiments
to textile fiber in the late 19th century, and by the
dawn of the 20th century, the age of manmade fibers
began. These inventions would revolutionize the
fashion industry; today, more than half of all textile
fibers produced in the world are synthetic.

To take these new fibers from laboratory to

marketplace, manufacturers actively marketed them
directly to consumers. Vintage ads of the 20th
century reveal how the synthetic fiber industry gave its
products status in the eyes of the public. In response,
producers of cotton and other natural fibers began to
advertise directly to consumers in order to survive.

During World War II, nylon was
restricted to military use. After four
years of rationing, it was reintroduced
in ads like this one, from 1947. To the
public, nylons meant legs.

Rayon
Rayon fiber, the first manmade alternative to silk, is created from a
solution of wood pulp and chemical solvents that is forced through
small holes in a metal plate known as a spinnerette. The earliest
rayon, patented in 1855, was extremely flammable and weak; nonflammable rayon, sometimes marketed as “artificial silk,” was introduced in the 1890s. Natural silk imports from Japan and China were
cut off during World War I, making rayon indispensable to the textile
industry. In the U.S., commercial rayon production began in 1910, and
its popularity increased through the 1920s and ’30s. Elsa Schiaparelli
was one of the first couture designers to recognize that rayon draped
and took colorful dyes beautifully.

However, rayon fabrics did not stretch and recover well and

tended to shrink after laundering. In this 1943 ad for Cannon
Hosiery (right), rayon stockings are promoted because silk was
rationed during World War II. The ad cautions that these stockings
need to air-dry for 36 hours!

NYlon
This year marks the 75th anniversary of the invention of nylon, by DuPont chemist Wallace Carothers.
The first completely synthetic fiber, created from
petroleum derivatives, nylon was stronger than any
natural fiber, lustrous, resilient, and quick-drying.

DuPont, the firm responsible for the slogan

“Better Living Through Chemistry,” introduced this
miracle to the public at the 1939 New York World’s
Fair. Recognizing the purchasing power of women
and their need for an affordable, durable substitute
for silk stockings, DuPont built a knitting plant to
produce ladies’ hose in Wilmington, DE.

After an extensive introductory advertising

campaign, the first nylon stockings went on sale on
May 15, 1940. On the first day, 780,000 pairs sold.

During World War II, all nylon production was

for government use, for parachutes and other military
gear. When the war ended, DuPont partnered with
designers like Christian Dior to turn nylon stockings
into a status symbol. Meanwhile, nylon began to be
incorporated into sportswear, lingerie, accessories,
and other textiles in need of strength and durability.

18

hue | spring 2013

Polyester
Six decades after DuPont introduced it to
the U.S. market, polyester accounts for
about 75 percent of all synthetic fibers
produced worldwide.

Why? It’s strong, wrinkle resistant,

doesn’t shrink, and dries quickly. It’s
thermoplastic, meaning that it can be
shaped and molded to create permanent
creases, like the pants in the ad (right)
in which a happy housewife celebrates
her husband’s iron-free slacks. Specialty
variations wick away moisture in activewear, and provide safe, flame-resistant
fabrics for home and industry.

But polyester’s real fashion value was

its ability to add wash-and-wear properties to natural fibers, especially cotton. Galey & Lord, a major
American cotton textile manufacturer, was the first mill to weave
cotton/polyester blends, in the mid-’50s. That launched the era
of easy-care fashion, as seen in the Dacron and flax dress in the
1958 DuPont ad (far right).

Polyester fiber is, however, derived from petroleum, a non-

renewable resource. Today, “recycled” polyester, created from
recycled plastic bottles, reflects our 21st-century desire to create
products with less impact on the environment.

Acrylic
Rayon and nylon fulfilled the consumer’s desire for a silk substitute, but wool was out of test-tube range until the petrochemical
acrylonitrile was successfully extruded into acrylic fiber in
1942. In 1950, DuPont began to produce acrylic fiber in the
U.S., while the German firm Bayer followed with acrylic production in 1954.

LUREX
Throughout history, humans have craved textiles that shine. Early on,
the glitter came from metal foils, wrapped in strips around another
fiber for strength. The most luxurious fabrics incorporated gold and
silver, and there was a quest for materials that would perform better, at
lower cost. In 1946, the Dobeckmun Company sealed aluminum vapor
between two layers of plastic film, creating a shiny fiber they called
Lurex. Lightweight, flexible, and washable, it was an instant success
with fashion designers and was soon incorporated into upholstery,
accessories, and automobile interiors. Hollywood and haute couture
embraced the sparkle, as in Thierry Mugler’s 1987–89 polyester and
Lurex gown (below).

San Francisco textile designer Dorothy Liebes may be the person
most responsible for the success of
Lurex. Known for unexpected materials like feathers, plastics, metallics,
and ticker tape, she was a consultant to fiber producers DuPont, Dow,
Bigelow-Sanford, and Goodall Fabrics;
her clients included Frank Lloyd
Wright and the King of Saudi Arabia.
This 1954 Vogue ad (right) features
Lurex accessories made with fabrics
MFIT

by Liebes.

SPANDEX
Since it was first produced by DuPont in 1959, spandex has
shaped the fashion world more than any other fiber. DuPont’s
trademarked name for it is Lycra.

Spandex can be stretched up to 500 times its original

length without breaking, returning easily to its original
shape. Just 2 to 5 percent spandex will give a fabric excellent stretch-and-recovery performance.

Spandex was introduced to the consumer in the early

1960s in the form of lightweight support garments, like the
1961 Lady Marlene foundation-wear advertisement (far left).

Soon, spandex moved from its supporting role in under-

garments to shaping the silhouette of sport and exercise
fashions. Well-toned celebrities like Christie Brinkley (right)
and Jane Fonda popularized spandex leotards for aerobic
workouts through their video and television appearances.
Moving the aerobic look into couture, Jean Paul Gaultier
chose nylon/spandex fabric for his 1996 catsuit (left). Today,

MFIT

spandex is used to add a sleek silhouette to everything

20

hue | spring 2013

from activewear to automobile interiors.

Cotton
With the growing popularity of synthetics threatening their industry,
American cotton growers realized they needed to market directly to
the public in order to regain market share. In 1970, they founded
Cotton Incorporated to renew consumers’ bond with the fiber. The
“Seal of Cotton” logo was created for labels on apparel and home tex-

launched in 1989. Prime-time television ads featured gingham-clad
children, cowboys in denim, and laundry flapping in the wind, with a
heart-tugging theme song performed first by Richie Havens, later

T R A N S P O R TAT I O N
Cars will be made out of
soybeans and old dishwashers
and will run entirely on
decomposed rubbish.

by Aaron Neville, and recently by Miranda Lambert. Cotton was
portrayed as natural, comfortable, and authentically American.

Meanwhile, Cotton Incorporated has invested in extensive

research and development, to make cotton agriculture more efficient,
and the fabric easier to use and care for. New plant varieties need less
water, chemicals, and acreage to grow; new fabric treatments keep

HOMES
The American dream
will be constructed
from prefabricated
components made of
polymerized resins,
mulch and
old hip-hop CDs.

to approximately 75 percent of U.S. apparel and home furnishings
from a low of 33 percent in 1973. This year, the U.S. cotton industry
will produce $6.86 billion in revenue, and approximately four of the
24 million tons of cotton produced globally.
CLOTHING
Tomorrow‘s designers will shun space-age fabrics for
natural fibers such as 100% cotton. The look? Comfortable,
practical and totally fashion forward.

Textile/Surface Design ’96, Illustration ’94, principal and
creative director of Malene B Custom Handmade Carpets
Each of Malene Barnett’s graphic rugs tells a story from her
worldwide wanderings. Papunya, swirls of raised brown pile
surrounding islands of colorful points of light, is inspired by the
dot patterns of Australian aborigines. Wolof, rows of bell-shaped
figures bedecked in bright clothing and jewelry, celebrates the
Wolof people of Senegal. And St. Vincent interprets the shifting
blues of Caribbean waters around the island where Barnett’s
mother was born.
“I’m trying to give people a global experience through carpet,”
she says.
She founded her namesake company (maleneb.com) in 2009
after cutting her design teeth at rug giant Nourison Industries,
working on collections for Nicole Miller, Liz Claiborne, and Martha
Stewart. Though she enjoyed working for others, she wanted
the creative freedom of owning her business and fashioning her
company culture.
“I was taking a big chance with bold designs in a world where
most carpets were quiet and simple,” she says.
When ordering a Malene B rug, customers choose between
hand-knotting and hand-tufting by artisans throughout Asia.
Hand-knotted carpets, crafted from thousands of knots of wool,
are costly but can last for generations. Hand-tufted carpets,
made by firing loops of yarn with a tufting gun into a stretched
canvas backing, are less expensive but still carry the prestige of
being handmade.
This year, Barnett is presenting an even more affordable
option, as Surya, a well-known manufacturer of home accessories,
began including her designs in its retail collections. These rugs,
also handmade (either tufted or woven), start at $599.
Her carpets have been a runaway critical success, earning
articles in Interior Design, House Beautiful, and Elle Decor
magazines and finding their way into homes and hotel lobbies
alike. “My customers look at my carpets as works of art,” she says.
“Some want them for their walls instead of their floors.”
Left: Barnett in her Brooklyn studio.

Matthew Septimus

Background: Mehndi is based on her experience getting her hands
hennaed before a friend’s wedding.

22

hue | spring 2013

Holly Henderson

KC Kratt

Fashion Design ’81, founder and creative director,
Simply Natural Clothing
Faced with the choice between shelling out $300 for a single sweater or for
ten different garments, how many consumers will choose the former? “The
past couple of generations have been programmed to think fast fashion, that
they have to wear a new outfit every day,” Holly Henderson says. Getting
back to the quality and durability of years past is one reason Henderson
started Simply Natural Clothing (simplynatural
clothing.com), producing natural-fiber garments—
mostly alpaca—from concept to manufacture,
exclusively in the United States. “Yes, I’m spending
$300 on a sweater, but I’ll be able to wear it for
ten years because it’s special and it won’t fall apart
after a couple of washings,” she adds. “I think
this shift in mentality is starting to happen.”
With 30-plus years in the industry, Henderson
has seen more than a few shifts. She’s worked
as a fashion illustrator and a knitwear designer,
but gained renown as a tech expert, programming computerized knitting machines. In 1987,
Henderson opened Deerwood Designs, the first
independent CAD and production development
studio, where she worked with major companies
like Liz Claiborne, Macy’s, Tommy Hilfiger, and
Jones Apparel Group. She became an adjunct
faculty member in FIT’s Textile/Surface Design
Department in 1997.
A nature and animal lover, Henderson was
inspired when a friend started an alpaca farm in
her hometown of Clarence, NY. “It was kind of
a joke at first,” she explains. “I said, ‘One day I’ll
make something out of their fleece.’” Encouraged
by the results of her initial “experiments” with
the shorn fibers, which possess superior durability
and softness, she launched Simply Natural in 2011,
offering a line of drapey, artisanal-yet-refined
gloves, leg warmers, scarves, and capes.
Henderson programs her designs on a computer,
inputting measurements, stitches, patterns, yarns,
and other technical data, creating realistic 3D
renderings, and producing her sweaters and fashion accessories on a wholegarment knitting machine. Despite their luxurious look, the mostly seamless
pieces range from just $36 to $495. “Because we don’t produce a lot of extra
inventory, and we don’t create a lot of waste, we’re keeping costs manageable,”
she says.
Henderson’s farm-to-fashion philosophy focuses on sustainable materials,
supporting the local economy, and even upcycling used items, and the company
employs direct sales and marketing. Her lean business model minimizes
waste and maximizes growth, all while producing beautiful, style-conscious
products. For Henderson, it’s a natural. —Robin Catalano
Above: Henderson wearing Simply Natural Clothing at Diamond Alpacas in Clarence, NY.
Background: A close-up of an alpaca mitten.

ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

23

David Drozdis

Nick Parisse ’09

Textile/Surface Design ’00, director of fabric
operations, Ralph Lauren Home
David Drozdis is one of those rare souls who think with
both sides of their brain. He encourages Ralph Lauren
Home’s designers to dream while considering the limitations of offshore production. In the same breath, he
pushes factories to improve quality and shave costs. And
somehow, while solving a crisis a minute, he manages to
deliver on time. The soft goods he oversees—bedding and
towels, for example—end up in 800 department stores
around the world.
“I see the veins that connect design with reality,
and I find a way to join the two,” he says.
Sometimes the design team asks him to develop
fabrics for specific projects, but he’s much happier
working proactively to offer the designers textiles they
hadn’t dreamed of.
To that end, Drozdis challenges suppliers to return
to handwork, the way textiles used to be produced. He
learns about indigenous embroidery techniques and
trains Ralph Lauren’s factories to reproduce them. If
a vendor offers him a machine-made tie-dye, he asks
instead for a fabric dip-dyed by hand. Sometimes he
brings in complicated handwork just to prove that it
can be done.
“I want something that reflects the human hand,”
he explains. “That’s going to be on my tombstone.”
His left brain comes into play as he finds clever
ways to meet consumer demand for lower prices. He
negotiates discounts on cotton and silk, simplifies weave
structures, and tests machine-made embroidery that
looks handwrought. Slight imperfections thrill him.
Nature inspires him, from the play of light across
surfaces to the way colors change throughout the day.
Before enrolling at FIT, he studied to be a forest ranger
but couldn’t stomach the paperwork. He often skipped
class just to walk through the woods.
The chance to escape into nature puts his life into
perspective. “I often think, ‘What’s the importance of
my work?’ If our customers knew about all the details
that went into creating these fabrics, they wouldn’t care.
But I remember that, sometimes on a subconscious level,
the beautiful product we create enhances their lives.”
Above: Drozdis in the Ralph Lauren offices.
Background: A mercerized cotton dobby weave developed
in 2012 for a throw or blanket.

24

hue | spring 2013

Nina Terzian

Marketing: Fashion and Related Industries ’91, senior director,
fabric research and development for Chico’s

Jin Lee

Fashion Merchandising Management ’01, fabric R&D manager

Melissa Dunlay Kossmann

Fashion Merchandising Management ’00, fabric R&D manager
For most clothes shoppers, the look and feel of the fabric is key. At Chico’s,
the Fort Myers, FL-based apparel chain of 600 boutiques, a 12-person team
(that includes five FIT alums) is devoted to discovering, developing, and
testing the newest, softest, most beautiful fabrics in the world. They scour
textile trade shows in Paris, Shanghai, and New York, and work with mills
to create fabrics using cutting-edge textile technology.
“We have to be ten steps ahead of everybody else,” says Nina Terzian,
who oversees the department. “Our customer looks for one-of-a-kind items,
and we look for one-of-a-kind fabric.”
When selecting fabrics, the team thinks like the Chico’s customer, a
40-plus woman who will spend a bit more for style and slimming features
and wants to look fashionable yet comfortable.
“She wants to look updated, not trendy,” explains Melissa Kossmann, in
charge of bottoms, including denim. “I look for super-stretch, not too heavy,
and great hand-feel.”
Often, their work involves developing affordable facsimiles of pricey
fabrics. When Jin Lee, in charge of fabrics for knit tops and for Chico’s
outlets, fell in love with antique lace from a Paris flea market, she helped
develop a mass-producible version. And when cotton prices spiked in 2011,
the team researched spun polyester yarns that felt like cotton at a fraction
of the cost.
“Our job is to make the beautiful,
complicated stuff into something we
can afford,” Lee says.
Chico’s design and product teams
focus on creating easy-care styles that
require little to no ironing and no dry
cleaning. Ornamental fringes, which
were lighting up runways, won’t be
seen on a Chico’s rack because they
scrunch up in the dryer.
Chico’s develops, tests, and
purchases hundreds of fabrics per
season. Once Terzian has approved
each one, she communicates her
excitement to Chico’s designers and
buyers. The team is knowledgeable in
fabric science, but much of their work
relies on instinct. “You touch it, you
feel it, it’s luxurious,” Terzian riffs.
“It sings to you.”
Right: Lee, Terzian, and Kossmann at
a recent denim trade show.

Nick Parisse ’09

Background: This leopard-print knit,
developed in a mill in Korea, was used in
a best-selling crewneck top that debuted
in fall 2012.

ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

25

How the industry is committing to sustainable production
By Jonathan Vatner
extiles are essential to
every aspect of our world.
“There is rarely a minute
we are not in contact with
a textile, from our birth to
our death,” says Sass
Brown, Global Fashion
Management ’07, assistant dean of the School of
Art and Design. “There’s almost nothing in our
environment that this industry doesn’t impact.”
According to Textile Exchange, a nonprofit
committed to sustainability, more than 60 million
tons of textiles are produced every year worldwide,
20 pounds for every human on the planet. (Four
fifths of that comprises apparel and home furnishings.) The sheer amount is hard on our environment,
from creating the fibers to disposing of them.
Here, sustainability experts discuss the ecological cost of textiles throughout their life cycle
and how manufacturers and consumers are
lessening it.

T

Raw material extraction. Each fiber has a different
ecological story. Polyester production consumes
70 million barrels of oil each year, and it breaks
down very slowly—if at all—in landfills. Growing
cotton is pesticide- and water-intensive. Jeffrey
Silberman, chair of the Textile Development and
Marketing Department, says that genetically
modified cotton needs less water and less pesticide, and is easier to harvest. However, Shona
Quinn, International Trade and Marketing ’00,
sustainability officer at Eileen Fisher, worries
about the long-term consequences of genetically
modified crops. “Engineering crops is not always
considered good,” she says.

26

hue | spring 2013

70
MILLION

Organic cotton, which is grown without pesticides, is also catching on. H&M, the largest buyer
of organic cotton in the world, aims to source all its
cotton sustainably by 2020.
Recycling reduces environmental impact
considerably. Polyester can be melted down and
reused, but not if it was blended with a natural
fiber. Polyester fabric can also be made from used
plastic bottles; the recycled fiber Repreve is one
example. Nylon from carpets can be recycled, too.
Ajoy Sarkar, associate professor of Textile Development and Marketing, says that the recycling of
synthetics has become a major source of new
product. Another source, he says, is plant-derived
polymers, such as PLA and Sorona, which are
used in apparel, upholstery, and carpeting. Cotton
and wool can be recycled as well but must be
unveiled a coat made of recycled wool that is less
mixed with virgin material for strength. expensive than most of its virgin wool coats.
Companies are beginning to take recycling
“The rather daunting challenge in the next
seriously. U.K. retailer Marks & Spencer recently
five, ten, and 20 years will be to scale these shifts

barrels of oil
go into polyester
production annually

across the textile industry,” says Heidi McCloskey,
senior director of communications and resource
development at Textile Exchange.

The Average
American throws away

68 lbs
of textiles each year

Production. According to Textile Exchange, one
trillion kilowatt hours are used yearly in the manufacturing process: spinning, weaving, dyeing,
cutting, sewing, and shipping. The carbon footprint
from this energy use adds up to 10 percent of the
global total.
Dyeing is a major polluter. “You’re basically
putting the fabric in a tub of water with some
chemistry and some colorants, and you heat it up
and treat it and heat it some more,” Quinn says.
“You get a really beautiful fabric—and a lot of
wastewater with toxins in it.” The World Bank

More than

60 MILLION
tons of textiles are
produced worldwide
each year

estimates that 20 percent of industrial freshwater
pollution comes from textile treatment and dyeing.
The dyeing process also consumes a great
deal of water. Textile production uses more water
than any industry in the world except agriculture.
The embedded water content of an object is
the amount of water that went into producing it.
Brown says that the embedded water content for
the average pair of jeans, from creating the fiber
to washing it before it’s shipped, is 3,000 gallons.
Multiply that by the 450 million pairs of jeans sold
every year in the U.S., and that’s 1.4 trillion gallons
of water. “We think of water as a renewable resource, but we have not been working within
nature’s limitations,” Brown says.
Solutions are on the horizon, though. For example, factories that recycle the water used in dyeing—
called closed-loop dye houses—are becoming more
prevalent globally.
At just about every stage of the manufacturing
process, from fiber left on the cotton plant to fabric

discarded after cutting, Brown considers 15
percent waste to be the norm. That adds up to a
massive amount of discarded fabric. Some designers, including those at Eileen Fisher, are experimenting with zero-waste designs. (For another
designer’s take on it, see page 9.)
Quinn says that 98 percent of apparel in the
U.S. is imported, and shipping consumes a significant amount of petroleum. Though it’s not always
fast enough for fashion, transporting products by
sea has a much smaller carbon footprint than by
air. “If a company is shipping by sea, that’s a huge
step,” Quinn says. “If they’re producing locally,
even better.”

3,000

gallons of water
are needed to make
one pair of jeans

Maintenance. Consumers use considerable
amounts of energy, water, and chemicals when
cleaning textiles, especially clothes. From this
perspective, polyester is a winner because it dries
quickly and doesn’t need ironing, as are products
like blazers and curtains that don’t need to be
cleaned frequently.
End of life. The average American throws away
68 pounds of textiles every year, totaling 25 billion
pounds. Only 15 percent of that is recycled, either
donated to developing countries, shredded for car
upholstery stuffing, or reused as rags in factories.
Eventually, all of it is incinerated or buried.
One solution is to create timeless investment
pieces that are made to last. Silberman points
out Patagonia’s refreshing “Buy Less, Buy Used”
campaign, which encourages customers to repair
their garments instead of buying new. Another

the More than 1 TRILLION
kilowatt hours used annually in textile
manufacturing could power

87 MILLION
homes for a year.

tack is to wear used and vintage clothes. Green
Eileen, for example, is Eileen Fisher’s new clothing
recycling program, which donates its profits to
women’s and girls’ initiatives. But for fashionistas
who pride themselves on wearing the most current
colors and styles, reusing is a difficult sell.
There are more global solutions amid all these
statistics. Brown says it’s about connecting with
our clothes and furnishings. If we care about
where our things came from and who made them,
they won’t seem as disposable. Silberman believes
that improved efficiency has cleaned up textile
production. “If you’re running your business well,
you’re probably wasting less,” he says. “I see a lot
of movement in terms of good practices.”
Quinn says companies have the power to reduce
the environmental impact of textiles by up to 70
percent through their decisions; they just need to
find ways to create eco-friendly designs that are
beautiful and therefore desirable. “I would like to
think this industry can be a leader for our environment,” she says.
ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

An anthropology collection contains not only “masterpieces,” the finest examples
of a culture or technique that stand alone on their aesthetic merits (though the museum
has many such works). Every possible object, from the everyday to the exceptional, is
collected and documented. Tools, unfinished pieces, and researchers’ field notes are
among the approximately 400 catalogue records added each year. New objects must fill
in a gap or enhance a collection, and tell a story about the way people live. Textiles are
categorized as ethnographic (collected from living peoples) or archaeological (made
by ancient peoples and excavated).
Murillo helps find the best ways to store and retrieve objects, maintains catalogue
records, and cleans the pieces and the spaces in which they’re housed. She also assists
researchers who come to study the collection. Sometimes she witnesses epiphanies. For
example, a curator descended from the A’aninin tribe of the Plains Indians was studying
a muslin tipi liner that depicts the tribe’s greatest warriors and their brave deeds in battle.
The curator realized he’d seen a key that an anthropologist had created to explain the
liner’s imagery at a museum in Berlin. The curator not only reunited the liner with its
key, but was able to identify his great-great-grandfather in several scenes.

28

hue | spring 2013

Indigenous artists work with the collection,
too. In her first months on the job, Murillo met a
Colombian artist who came to study the museum’s
chumbe, woven belts worn by Inga women, and
compare them to belts by native peoples of the
Peruvian and Bolivian Andes. By observing the
chumbe firsthand, the artist was able to bring
knowledge of old weaving techniques and symbols
back to his community.
On the following pages, Hue presents five
highlights from the collection, selected by Murillo.

Matthew Septimus

The American Museum of Natural History is among the
most venerable scientific and cultural institutions in the
world. Its 32 million objects—essential to the study of the
universe, nature, and human culture—are researched,
catalogued, stored, and preserved by experts, such as the
museum’s scientific assistant for textiles, Mary Lou Murillo,
MA Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum
Practice ’09. Murillo works in the anthropology division,
where she’s in charge of 13,500 textiles found all over the
world in clothing, accessories, and domestic goods. “I get
to see a huge range of techniques and materials, and ways
that people solve basic problems of how to attire themselves,
or decorate,” she says. “There’s so much variety here.”

Catalogue number 70/2280

Man’s Summer Coat
(Shanghai, China)
Date: 1850-75 A.D.

This robe features dragons in metallic couch work,

cate it as a court garment, unlike less ornate copies

an elaborate and time-consuming method of

made for the marketplace. The influence of China’s

embroidery that incorporates costly gold and silver.

Manchu conquerors can be seen in stylistic changes

Gilt paper is wrapped around a cotton core to make

to the shape of the robe. “The contour of the collar

threads that are secured, or “couched” to the fabric

and the way it overlaps from left to right echo the

with small stitches at regular intervals. Collected in

shape of the hide garments of the Manchu horsemen,”

1901, the robe dates from 1850-75, placing it during

Murillo says. “Manchu influence is also apparent in

China’s final dynasty, the Qing. These dates and its

the horse-hoof-shaped cuffs, designed to help protect

luxurious materials and construction all authenti-

the ungloved hands of riders on the windy steppes.”

ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

29

Catalogue number 41.2/8604

Tunic (Wari, Peru)
Date: 600-1000 A.D.
How have 1,500-year-old textiles survived to the
present day? In the case of this Wari tunic (detail,
right), geography and luck. The Wari people were
found chiefly in the highlands of Peru, but most of
their textiles survive because they were brought
down to coastal burials, where the semi-arid climate
provided pre-modern preservation. The museum’s
collection of archaeological textiles is predominately pre-Columbian and Andean, largely for this
reason. Tunics like this one, a standardized elite
garment, are thought to have been woven on
short, wide looms, although no such looms survive.
This is because of the unusual direction of the warp
threads: horizontal rather than vertical. (Warp
threads are held in tension on a loom and usually
run vertically; weft threads are woven over and
under warps.) “Lazy” lines, or subtle variations in
the weave, indicate that multiple hands probably
worked on a single piece, much easier to do on a
loom that was wider than it was tall. Fibers of cotton
warp and animal-hair weft are woven in extraordinarily fine interlock tapestry. A single tunic
comprises an average of six to nine miles of thread.

Catalogue number: 50.2/6706

Child’s Pictorial Blanket
(Navajo, New Mexico, USA)
Date: 1880s
The AMNH has a large collection of Navajo
blankets, but this traditionally woven child’s
blanket from the 1880s has an atypical motif:
trains. “Navajo weavers witnessing changes to
the world around them, such as the transcontinental railroad, incorporated these themes
into their textiles,” Murillo says. The railroad,
an emblem of industrialization, is paired here
with the traditional Navajo symbol of the thunderbird. A unique construction detail makes
this blanket unmistakably Navajo: its edge, or
selvage, has a distinctive pattern of small diagonal white stripes (far left). These are warp
threads, normally unseen, but visible because
Navajo weavers twist their warp threads at the
selvage approximately every quarter inch.

30

hue | spring 2013

Catalogue number: 90.2/9922

Wax-resist fabric (Dutch)
Date: contemporary
This recent acquisition adds to the history of Dutch
wax-resist fabric. In the 19th century, Dutch merchants
traveled and traded along the West African coast on
their way to the Dutch Indies. In the mid-1800s, they
began to trade and produce Javanese-style batik, or wax
cloth, initially deemed a failure because the Indonesians
would not buy the Dutch-made versions. When they
docked in Africa, however, the Dutch discovered that the
cloth appealed to West Africans, for whom it quickly
became the height of fashion. By the early 1900s, Dutch
manufacturers were producing “African-style” Javaneseinspired wax cloth for this new market. Vlisco, the firm
that manufactured this piece, is one of the original
companies. Today, discerning West African women forgo
lesser-quality Chinese and Indonesian imitations to
purchase genuine Dutch wax cloth from specialty stores.
The dice print (right) appealed to the museum’s curator
for African ethnology, a games specialist and expert on
mancala, a family of board games played around the
world. The cracked pattern in the background was an
imperfection in the early fabrics that appealed to West
African customers, so the Dutch continued to incorporate it.

Catalogue number 70.1/5272

Man’s Hemp Jacket
(Bagobo, Mindanao,
Santa Cruz, Philippines)
Date: circa 1900 A.D.
The Bagobo of the Philippines have a reputation among anthropologists as a tribe who
invested almost all of their creative energy
into adorning themselves. This jacket of
abaca cloth and cotton is a stunning example
of Bagobo decoration. It features elaborate
glass beadwork, metal sequins, kalati shell disks,
and embroidery. Laura Watson Benedict, the
second woman in the world to receive a PhD
in anthropology, did fieldwork among the
Bagobo in 1906-07. She described how, during
their journeys through the forest to visit neighboring tribes, they kept their best clothes
packed safely in elaborately beaded bags.
Just before they reached their destination,
they changed into their finery and made a
grand entrance. Benedict pioneered ethnographic collecting methods that have evolved
into the present day holistic approach. A
page from her notebook appears at left. 

ﬁtnyc.edu/hue

31

1964

Grave Beauty

Jan Milsinovic Rollenhagen,

Ski Holm, Fine Arts ’80

paints gourds
in western Nevada. The
gourds, called lagenaria, are
grown for ornamental
reasons; farmers pick them
and leave them in a furrow
for a few months, occasionally rotating them, while
they dry out. Rollenhagen
scrapes them clean, then
Owl on a Branch, 28 by
paints and sometimes carves 14 inches, $1,000.
or burns them. She often teaches the art at gourd
festivals on farms in California. Earlier in life, she
designed undergarments for handicapped people,
artificial breasts for mastectomy patients, and
lingerie and swimwear for Olga, a leading brand.

Michael Nelson

news from your classmates

Fashion Design,

1971
Jayne Dalton-DiPierro, Fashion Buying and Merchandising,

1973

Marvin Carney, Photography, designs and shoots photos
for the Delaware Beach Book, an annual tourism guide
to the southern Delaware coast, which he co-founded
with his wife and their friend. The hardcover book,
which features a handful of stories about local people
plus listings of restaurants and other attractions, has
been a success: each year, 90 percent of advertisers
from the previous guide return.

1985

Karl Rivenburgh, Photography, is a freelance photographer in East Northport, NY, who worked for Canon
USA doing product, corporate, and event photography
for ten years. A champion skeet shooter, he has
written and photographed more than 40 stories for
the Skeet Shooting Review.

In February, Ski Holm held a solo exhibition of paintings of the past three decades called Cemetery:
The Unintended Subject, at Mercersburg Academy in Mercersburg, PA. Most of the works, including
Cemetery at the Bend, above, depict a graveyard he has painted 20 times. For this version, he
remained faithful to his photograph, though he took out cars and telephone poles and added shadow
to the lower left, a technique called repoussoir in which an object in the foreground invites the eye into
the painting. “It keeps the painting from sliding off the canvas,” he says. He is struck by the simplicity
of gravestones and low walls, contrasted against “these ungodly beautiful landscapes around them.”
But the main reason for visiting the cemetery so often, alone and with art classes he teaches, is
neither about beauty nor some dark obsession with death. “First, it’s across from my house,” he says.
“Second, cemeteries have good parking.”

1986

co-founded two
companies with his wife Ruth (see 1987). One is HoneyGramz,
selling bear-shaped bottles of honey with a message on the label,
such as “You’re so sweet, honey.” They also offer a line of
honey-infused natural skincare products called Mee Beauty,
named after the Chinese word for honey. Harrigan is pursuing
his Doctor of Physical Therapy degree at Columbia University
Medical School, and his book, Body Energy: Unlock the Secrets of
the Chinese Energy Clock, has been a best seller on Amazon.com.
Matthew Harrigan, Advertising and Communications,

Kieran Harrigan

has owned On Your Toes Dancewear in Staten Island
for 20 years. When the store opened, most dancers
wore the same uniform: pink tights and ballet
slippers. Since then, Dalton-DiPierro has widened
her selection because dance students can wear
almost anything in class. Last fall, she moved her
store to a much larger space.

1987

cultivates
more than a dozen beehives throughout New York City, including one on 27th Street in Manhattan, in order to harvest honey
for the companies she co-founded with her husband (see 1986).
For Mee Beauty, she works with a laboratory to develop skincare formulas with as much honey as possible without becoming
sticky. She also creates the labels at home and sells the products
at local fairs and through a growing number of stores.

A photo of a restored mid-century Willys pickup truck that
Rivenburgh spotted in Bridgehampton last summer.

32

hue | spring 2013

Kieran Harrigan

Ruth Ma Harrigan, Fashion Buying and Merchandising,

Top, the line of Mee Beauty
Products. Above, Ruth Harrigan
with one of her beehives.

Lisa Liscio, Fashion Design, co-owns Bridal Trousseau on Main,
near New Haven, CT. The boutique, in a loft-like space that
used to be a bowling alley, sells wedding gowns by popular
designers such as Matthew Christopher and Pronovias, as
well as tuxedos and party dresses. In April, the boutique
will be featured on the Season 2 premiere of the TLC show
I Found the Gown, by the producers of Say Yes to the Dress.

A Visual Feast
Valeria Napoleone, MA Gallery and Retail Art Administration ’97
Cooking dinner might seem to have little to do with
art collecting, but for Valeria Napoleone, preparing
food is integral to the job. While at FIT, the Italian
native began having artists over for dinner, using the
homemade meals as a chance to build relationships

1992

with them. She continued the tradition when she
graduated, moved to London, and started building her

Matthew Goodman, Interior Design, Display and Exhibit Design ’88,

collection. “I host dinners where I put artists in touch

is art director for Center Stage Productions, a firm that
designs holiday displays and playspaces for shopping malls
owned by publicly traded companies. Once the designs are
approved, Goodman oversees installation at night, while the
malls are closed. “You get to know every Denny’s and Waffle
House everywhere,” he says. Last fall, Center Stage’s
decorations for Water Tower Place in Chicago included a
light show blinking in time with the music, gigantic stainedglass snowflakes, and a seven-story lighting installation
featuring images of the Peanuts characters. Before coming
to Center Stage, Goodman oversaw visual presentation at
Lord & Taylor, Macy’s, and Victoria’s Secret.

with curators and other galleries,” she says, explaining
Jorge Monedero

that her goal as a collector is to promote promising

Napoleone in her home.

young artists who have not yet made a name for themselves. Napoleone’s parents collected antiques from
Renaissance Italy, so she grew up surrounded with
beautiful things, but in her own contemporary art

collection, “the objects are just a starting point—the relationship is more important.”
Today, she hosts six or seven dinners per year of roughly 100 people, plus numerous
smaller dinners, at the home she shares with her husband and three children in the
upscale neighborhood of Kensington in West London. All of the food is still homemade.
Napoleone’s kitchen staff helps her with the savory items, but
the desserts—around ten at any given party, including Italian
specialties like tiramisu, zabaglione mousse, apple tarts, and
marmalade cakes—are her domain. “I don’t trust anyone else
with them,” she says, laughing.
After one dinner during the 2010 Frieze Art Fair, a

Marian Kraus and Ron Gould

guest urged her to publish a cookbook; the result is Valeria

Center Stage Productions’ holiday display at Water Tower Place in Chicago.

1995

Napoleone’s Catalogue of Exquisite Recipes (Koenig Books
2012). The food is primarily Northern Italian, family recipes
from Napoleone’s mother and grandmother, plus a few
Sardinian dishes from her mother-in-law. Familiar Italian foods
like risotto and eggplant parmigiana appear alongside more obscure dishes like deepfried sage and Lombardy-style minced beef. Napoleone also enlisted 49 artists to illustrate
the book with works inspired by the idea of food. “One artist gave me a photo of herself at
5 years old in Communist Poland grinding wheat,” she says. “Another went to a convent in

Dori Oudkirk Fitzpatrick, Production

Hamburg and filmed nuns making bread, and gave me a series of images from that.”

Management: Apparel, sells

Napoleone is known for collecting exclusively female artists, and she credits her time

her
crocheted hats and blankets on Etsy.
Through an opportunity given by
the Artisans Group, a marketing
company that specializes in celebrity
gifting, one of her newsboy caps was
selected to be worn on an episode
of The Vampire Diaries. She subNina Dobrer in Fitzpatrick’s
mitted it because “it looked trendy, hat on The Vampire Diaries.
and I guess I could see a vampire running around in it.”

were incredible women artists being shown in galleries, and you were exposed to the fact
that women were under-recognized in the art world.” But the art she collects is eclectic—
paintings, sculpture, photography, and video, in figurative, conceptual, and abstract
styles—and is not overtly feminist. “It’s not a collection that has a political agenda,” she
says. —Christy Harrison

1998
Jill Courtemanche, Accessories Design and Millinery

1997

paints and silk
screens T-shirts in her Long Island City
apartment, then sells them online and at
a number of stores, including the gift shop
at the Queens Museum of Art. Each design
tells a story, from neighborhood scenes to
a photo of her cousin after a dog bit her in
the face. She is changing the name from
Q77 to Q88 to avoid a trademark conflict.

at FIT for helping shape this decision. She explains that in New York in the mid-’90s, “there

certificate, Visual Presentation and Exhibition Design ’97,

Christina Prudenti, Fine Arts,

Super Vintage
Boxer T, $45.

sells feminine, “1940s film star” hats of her own
creation and teaches millinery classes, both in her
new San Diego shop. Her pieces have been worn by
Yoko Ono, Donatella Versace, and the princess of
Denmark. She also carries hats by other designers,
who, like her, make everything by hand in the U.S.
Ideas usually come to her in her sleep, so she keeps a
sketchbook on her nightstand. “I’m not well-enough
rested,” she admits.

The Stylish
Bride, helping brides find one-of-a-kind wedding
gowns and bridesmaid dresses, plus bridal accessories
such as shoes, cuffs, handbags, and belts. Before
making recommendations, she explores her clients’
closets and interviews them to “absorb their style.”
In December 2012, she launched The Stylish
Dresser, which provides styling services—hair and
makeup, bustling the train, and fixing a broken
strap, for example—for brides on their wedding day.

Andrea and Marcus

news from your classmates

Julie Sabatino, Accessories Design, runs

2010

It’s in the Bag
Nicole Dillon, Fashion Merchandising Management ’06

Elliot Townsend

2003

Student projects generally start and end in the classroom, but for Nicole Dillon, one
assignment led to a promising career. For a class project in fall 2005, Dillon and four other
students brainstormed a redesign and marketing plan for BergdorfGoodman.com. Around

Vasumathi Soundararajan,

is “chief
underwearist” for Ken
Wroy, her new brand of
men’s underwear made in
screaming prints and bright
colors, geared toward the
metrosexual. Because the line is still small, she has a
cash-and-carry arrangement with a factory in India,
and she drop-ships to customers instead of selling
her stock to retailers. She finds that much of her
customer base is women buying the product for
boyfriends and husbands.

Fashion Design,

that time, Burt Tansky, then the president of Neiman Marcus Group, which owns
Bergdorf Goodman, spoke at FIT. Dillon approached him and told him the website needed
improvement, to capture the “spectacular fantasy” experience you get in the store. He gave
her team an audience with Bergdorf’s senior management.
When the day came, though, three of her classmates were out of town and one came
down with food poisoning. Remarkably, Dillon wasn’t nervous during her hour-long solo
presentation. Afterward, Jim Gold, then Bergdorf’s president, asked where she was
planning to work after graduation. She sent him her resume and was hired as an assistant
buyer in soft accessories and fur.
Two promotions later, she is now one of the store’s three handbag buyers, focusing on
European brands like Goyard, Balenciaga, Prada, Bottega Veneta, and Alexander McQueen.
She takes four buying trips a year, choosing favorites from the runways of Paris, Milan,
and Rome. For a West Virginian who had never been to Europe, the job is a dream. “Ever
since high school, I loved reading Vogue,” she says. “Now I’m helping launch the trends.”

2011

Harriet Jung, Fashion Design, is

an assistant designer
for Jill Stuart, working on the New York-based
designer’s eveningwear line. She also collaborates
with Reid Bartelme (see 2012) on costume design for
ballet dancers. They recently created 18 costumes
based on ’50s beachwear for Paz de la Jolla, choreographed by the 25-year-old Justin Peck for the New
York City Ballet.

Buying for a store with just one location allows her the luxury of working hands-on.
“If one bag did really well, I’ll often call a manager and ask, ‘Why did we sell so many?’”
So what makes the perfect bag? According to Dillon, it’s supple leather, an interior as
beautiful as the exterior, and, at least for now, a polished, minimalist look. But a bag, like
a person, needs something intangible to succeed.
“It has to have an emotional characteristic that makes you fall in love with it,” she says.
“It has to be able to contain your life.”

2012

designs dance costumes independently and with Harriet Jung (see 2011); the two connected at
FIT over their obsession with Belgian designer Raf Simons. A
former dancer with Lar Lubovitch, Bartelme began receiving
commissions because, he says, dance costumers are few and
far between. His pieces look like minimalist clothing and are
made with natural fibers, which must be cut on the bias to
allow stretching. No matter how many gussets he adds, though,
dancing is very hard on the costumes. “When we put the
costume on the dancer, we always say, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice
if they didn’t have to dance in it?’”

Charu Mehta, Jewelry Design,

is an associate jewelry
designer for the Adelington
Design Group, part of Fifth
& Pacific (formerly Liz
Claiborne). Her affordable
creations are sold at JC
Penney and Macy’s, among
other department stores. Read about her design
process on Hue Too (blog.fitnyc.edu/huetoo).

34

hue | spring 2013

Erin Baiano

Reid Bartelme, Fashion Design,

A dancer from Furiant, a ballet by
Justin Peck, costumed by Bartelme
and Jung.

sources of inspiration

For Fire Island (9/08), Tick wove together Mylar balloons that she found on the beach. Photo courtesy of Cristina Grajales Gallery.

Waste, Not

My dad was a third-generation scrap-metal-yard owner in Bloomington, IL,

Suzanne Tick

of recycled or “green” material, and most of my art has to do with reclamation.

Textile Design ’82

it? I’ve woven together dry-cleaning hangers, the paper from a box of Cowgirl

and I grew up surrounded by recycling. Most of my commercial work is made
Instead of throwing things away, why not make something beautiful out of
Creamery cheese, and a few bright pink tents left over from Brad Pitt’s Make
It Right campaign in New Orleans.

Recently, I started collecting washed-up Mylar balloons on the beaches

of Fire Island. I’ve collected 79 so far. I don’t know why people let them go;
either they’re casting a wish into the air, or maybe children drop them. I wash
them off and separate them by color, then cut them to make one big strand
that I weave together into a large hanging. People don’t know what it is when
they see it. The best time to get balloons is after a hurricane, so I named my
Fire Island series after the dates of the past few years of hurricanes. It draws
attention to the destructive quality of nature.

Tick is an award-winning developer of textiles, carpets, glass, and other
materials. Her titles include design director for Tandus Flooring and creative
director for textiles and materials for Teknion, a Toronto-based furniture
company. She was creative director of Knoll Textiles from 1996 to 2005. Her
fine art is represented by Cristina Grajales Gallery in New York City.